Unrest has beset the Walton's Wal-Mart empire. Workers at one of the world's biggest employers went on strike to protest low wages and have led a movement to unseat Rob Walton as chairman, but family's tight grip on the retailer--together they own 51% of the shares--gives them effective veto power. With $476 billion in revenue, Wal-Mart still reigns as the world's largest retailer, a far cry from the

company started by Sam Walton (d. 1992) and his brother James (d. 1995) in a small Arkansas town in 1962. Fortune they left behind is now split between Sam's three living children (pictured siblings: Jim and Alice Walton) and daughter-in-law, and, to a lesser extent, James' two daughters.

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